As we’ve often noted, this site is 100% supported by volunteers. After a 6 month run, we’ve decided that the effort to maintain the blog was taking time away from the forum and wiki. Much of the blog content has been copied to Barry Barnitz’s personal blog at Financial Page. Barry will maintain the blog from this point forward. No content will be removed from the Bogleheads site.

To explain: After the initial newness of the blog passed, we got into a weekly rhythm to simply repeat the blog posts. Those posts are always available in the wiki’s left side menu, see: News and blogs. The blog really did not provide added value.

We’ve also gotten into routinely reporting ETF fund flows, which can be posted in the forum just as easily. Our articles quite simply never generated any significant amount of discussion. There were one or two exceptions, but not enough to warrant a change in our decision.

The Bogleheads forum and wiki together work best for what we want to do. The blog was stuck in the middle. Given that we have limited resources and wanted to spend time in the forum and wiki, we decided to terminate the effort.

Taking charge of your finances is a life-long skill well worth learning. From keeping within a budget to managing your investments and loans; understanding a few basic concepts will put you in the driver’s seat.

You need a tool to use those concepts. In the world of personal finance, spreadsheets are the tool of choice. Although Microsoft Excel is the industry standard, there’s a free tool available that works in Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux: LibreOffice Calc

If you’ve never used a spreadsheet before, don’t be intimidated. Start with something simple and work towards more complicated topics. Take your time.

The Bogleheads’ wiki has a number of examples, which are discussed below. Many thanks to the forum members who’ve created and support these spreadsheets.

The Permanent Portfolio often sparks a passionate debate in the Bogleheads forum. For example, this epic 83 page discussion (72 pages here, continued for another 11 pages here). Why does this portfolio generate such an intense dichotomy?

“For the money you need to take care of you for the rest of your life, set up a simple, balanced, diversified portfolio. I call this a “Permanent Portfolio” because once you set it up, you never need to rearrange the investment mix— even if your outlook for the future changes. The portfolio should assure that your wealth will survive any event — including an event that would be devastating to any individual element within the portfolio… It isn’t difficult or complicated to have such a portfolio this safe. You can achieve a great deal of diversification with a surprisingly simple portfolio.”